Barbara Boxer

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I am speaking to an amendment that was offered by Senator DeMint, which he said he wants to reoffer. I want to address this amendment which unfairly targets and penalizes taxpaying Americans by denying them some very important appropriations that were approved by Congress in 2008. Senator DeMint came to the floor to describe actions that the city of Berkeley took last week in relation to the U.S. Marine Corps recruiting office. Let me be completely clear about those actions. Three of the members, in particular, wanted to send a letter expressing their disapproval of the Marines having a recruiting center in Berkeley. The language was offensive to many. I did not agree with anything they said. Now, on Tuesday, they explicitly stated that the ill-advised letter they were planning to send to the Marines would no longer be sent. Therefore, you would think Senator DeMint would then say, fine, I am glad they changed their mind. In addition, the city said this in writing. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the statement they made about the Marines, if I might.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, they said they ``deeply respect and support the men and women of our Armed Forces.'' I think the council did the right thing. They realized they should not mix up the Iraq war, which was brought to us by this President, and the warriors who fight it. There is a difference. They recognized that. I am very glad about that. You would think Senator DeMint would be very glad about that. He is not. He is still angry and he is still wanting to fight the battle of a couple weeks ago and not recognize the fact that this letter he was railing about, which offended him and many others, was never sent. That aside, the DeMint amendment is an attack on the rights of citizens to participate in free speech. There are a lot of things that go on in this country that I think are terrible; I think they are wrong, mean spirited, and hurtful. I think a lot of things, because we all have our own opinions on what is said. If every time I heard about some city councilman in some city in another State saying something I thought was offensive, that hurt our military, our seniors, disabled people, minorities or children, I came out here and said: Oh, my goodness, let's withhold funds from that city because of that city councilman, we would have quite a situation on our hands. State and local governments all across this Nation pass resolutions and measures that many of us don't agree with on a host of issues. Disagreements are part of the political discourse. Why on Earth would we punish good, decent citizens because some members of their local government or the sewer district or mosquito abatement district or water district or others say something that is offensive? Yes, we have a right to come to the floor, as Senator DeMint did, and say it is terrible and wrong and take it back. That is fine. I welcome that. But I don't sit around waiting to hear what they are saying in South Carolina, Georgia, Texas, and Oklahoma--those are the States of the Senators who want to take away these funds from the good people of northern California. I don't sit around waiting to see what they might say, and then say I am going to punish everybody because I don't agree with that speech. The other thing I found interesting is that in a press release the Senator from South Carolina, Senator DeMint, challenged the process by which the funding requests were granted by the Appropriations Committee. Today, he called them ``secret'' earmarks. Yet every one of these projects was funded in the most open and transparent manner. I will show you what those earmarks are. As a matter of fact, this is an opportunity for me to celebrate those particular projects because they are so important to the police, to the fire department, to the children, to the disabled, to students, to the memory of a wonderful Congressman Bob Matsui, and also to the environment. You will see what I mean. Every document pertaining to those projects was made available to the public. Every request was approved in the openness of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees and the openness of the House and Senate Chambers. If the Senator from South Carolina, Senator DeMint, was so concerned with these funding requests for our police, for our fire department, for our children, the disabled community, for our environment, and for our college students, he had the opportunity to challenge the funding of those requests. He had that opportunity when the bill was on the Senate floor. He didn't do that. Oh, no, he is going to challenge them because someone in the city council--several members--said something offensive that he didn't like and, therefore, as a result of that, instead of standing up and talking to those people who made those offensive comments and trying to change their mind, he tries to punish all the people in the surrounding area. The reason, I would posit, that the Senator didn't challenge these earmarks at the time they were made is because they are excellent programs. Congressional and executive funding requests, whether they are earmarks from the President or Congress, should be awarded based on merit, not based on what someone in a community said. It is just beyond belief. They should be able to stand on their own merits and serve the people we represent. I am going to show you some photographs that talk about some of these earmarks. The first is of these beautiful children standing in this garden that is run for the benefit of public schools in the Berkeley School District. These students learn how to plant and grow vegetables and harvest the vegetables. They work the garden. They learn about nutrition. They learn how to cook the food, serve the food, and clean up. This is such a popular program that it is being replicated in places as far away as Louisiana. We all know we have serious problems with our kids with diabetes. We know our kids don't eat the way we want them to because they are attracted to high-sugar foods and sodas and all the things that are not good for them. Here is a program that teaches them to love the whole notion of eating in a healthy way. That is a program Senator DeMint went after, along with his friends who are cosponsors. I wish to show you some other programs that are impacted. This is unbelievable. In this photo, we see a few of the most seriously disabled people you can find in America today. They want to live independently. Here is Ed Roberts, who needs oxygen every second, with a tube in his mouth. We want these wonderful people--some of them who are veterans--to be able to live independently. Here you see pictures of them doing that, with paralyzed bodies--children, moms. He wants to take away the funding because he disagreed with what some people said at the Berkeley City Council, which they now have taken back. Outrageous. Outrageous. Let's show you the other earmarks they are going after. Here are students at UC Berkeley. There is a program named after Bob Matsui, the beloved Congressman. They are going after that program as well. Here is a picture of congestion in the San Francisco Bay area, where you can see the Bay Bridge here; and you can barely tell it from where you are sitting, Mr. President, but all these dots are cars. We have the most congested areas in the country. We want to get funding for a ferry boat to carry people and get them out of their cars and use the waterways. This was Congresswoman Lee's earmark. He wants to cut this because he didn't agree with members of the council who have now taken back what they said. Here are our heroes, the firefighters. They are part of the recipients of an award that we said they deserve so there could be some communication in our region between the fire and the police in the jurisdiction, so that when we have a terror attack--and we hope we never do--or when we have a fire--and we often do--or an earthquake, which we often do, they have communications equipment. This is what Senator DeMint wants to take away from law-abiding firefighters because he didn't agree with something the city council said, which they took back. Here is the real point I have to make about all this. Senator Chambliss is an original cosponsor of the DeMint amendment challenging these earmarks. Let's look at an earmark he got in his State. It was for the Daugherty County School System Healthy Lifestyle Program. Ours is the Berkeley Unified School District School Lunch Initiative. I don't see Senator Chambliss trying to give up his program. I would never try to take that away from him because of something somebody said in his State that I didn't agree with. Here is Senator Cornyn, another proud sponsor of the DeMint amendment to slash these earmarks: Ed Roberts Disability Services Campus in Berkeley. I showed the people coming back from the war, paralyzed veterans in wheelchairs. Senator Cornyn wants to cut that earmark because the city council said something offensive which they have now since taken back. I would never go after Senator Cornyn's paratransit vehicle replacement in Abilene, TX. Here we go: The Strom Thurmond Fitness and Wellness Center at the University of South Carolina. We don't know who got that earmark because it was secret. It was secret. But I would never try to take away the Strom Thurmond Fitness and Wellness Center. Then let them leave alone the Bob Matsui Center for Public Service at UC Berkeley. Senator Inhofe, my friend, is a proud sponsor of this amendment, too. He has the Oklahoma City River Ferry Boat Transportation Program. He was proud to get that earmark. I would never go after that if someone in Oklahoma said something that I did not like, a city councilman, a mayor. Maybe I wouldn't like it and I might write them a letter and say what they said was wrong, unpatriotic, I don't agree with it. But I would never go after an earmark that helps move people from place to place. So let him leave alone the San Francisco water ferry. Here is Senator Vitter, another proud cosponsor of the DeMint amendment. I cannot tell my colleagues how many times I have helped Senator Vitter in my committee get help for the people of Louisiana. Do I agree with what every city council member says in Louisiana? Probably not. And if I did disagree with them, if they said something I found unpatriotic or not caring about our troops, I would send them a letter, but I wouldn't go after Senator Vitter's earmark for the Baton Rouge Communication Technology Pilot Program because I think it is important that police, fire, and emergency workers, who are our heroes, have the funding they need. The final item I want to show my colleagues is this: This move by Senator DeMint to take away the funding was addressed by the chair of the Military Affairs Department, Commanding Officer, ROTC, at the University of California. I want to read what he said about the University of California at Berkeley. I will just read certain statements: Given the recent spate of controversy surrounding the U.S. Marine recruiting office . . . I feel it is my obligation to inform members of Congress of the relationship we have with the university and the outstanding support it provides not just to the ROTC Program but to all military personnel, their dependents and veterans as well. UC Berkeley has been and continues to be a very big supporter of all our ROTC programs here on campus. They should in no way be associated with or linked to the actions of the Berkeley City Council which has taken on a very outspoken stance against the United States Marine Corps Recruiting Station in the city. . . . I would like to ensure that those in favor of the Semper Fi Act understand that UC Berkeley is a tremendous supporter of all the military programs on campus as well as all the military personnel, their dependents and veterans who attend this university. It would be a travesty of justice to . . . punish UC Berkeley for the actions of the Berkeley City Council. When this was written, I don't know whether Captain Laird knew that the Berkeley City Council did not send that letter and instead finally realized their mistake and said how much they support our men and women in uniform. The fact is, this kind of a punishment for a community such as this, a community of families who care about their country, who are taxpaying citizens, because of actions of a few, is an outrage. It would be a terrible precedent if we now started punishing children, policemen, firemen, disabled veterans, and students. If that is what we are going to become in this Senate, then we do not deserve to be here. That is absolutely wrong. The Marine Corps has given 232 years of exemplary service to our Nation and, tragically, 974 of the marines who served in Iraq paid the ultimate price. More than 440 of those were based at Twenty-nine Palms and Camp Pendleton in my home State of California. The Marines deserve our respect and our gratitude and our support. Again, I am glad that the council realized there is a difference between a war and a warrior. Again, Senator DeMint seems to be making political points on an issue that essentially was resolved. But if he wants to come here and debate with me why it is right to take away money from students, if he wants to debate with me why it is OK to take away money from disabled veterans, why it is OK to take away money from firefighters, many of whom are veterans, many of whom put their lives on the line every day, if he wants to have that debate, I will be on my feet, and I will have that debate. I know Senator Dorgan wishes to have the floor. Mr. President, is Senator Dorgan ready to make his UC request?

Mrs. BOXER. I will yield to Senator Dorgan or I can complete in 2 minutes.

Mrs. BOXER. The point I am making is, we all have our opinion on what constitutes free speech. I support Senator DeMint's right to express his opinion about what he thought of the proposed actions of the Berkeley City Council. He has every right to do that. He has every right to offer his amendment. But I have every right to come down here and say I think not only is it mean-spirited, it is hurtful to the wrong people. And I have every right to come down here and say: Senator DeMint, they never sent that letter to the Marines, happily. They rethought it. If he wants to continue with this amendment, if he wants to offer it to every bill we have, then I will be right down here with these photographs and others that I have. I will be right down here with more testimony from the military who will testify to how incredibly welcoming UC Berkeley is to our men and women in uniform. There will be wars in the future--we all hope there will not be, but there may be--with which we do not agree, but we must never confuse our anger at the people who would send our young people to a war of choice or a wrongheaded war and the young people who are sent there. We must come here every day to support those young men and women. Let's not use this as a way to take cheap political shots because they do not deserve it. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that immediately following Senator Feingold's 15 minutes on FISA, I be recognized for 10 minutes and that the time be taken from Senator Dodd's 4 hours.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I rise to speak about the FISA bill currently being considered by the Senate. I believe it is our duty to provide all the tools necessary to fight terrorism. We also have another duty--I would say a simultaneous duty, a sworn duty--to protect the constitutional rights of our citizens. So we have two duties. One is to protect the American people and give the Government the tools it needs to do that; two, to protect the constitutional rights of Americans. If we lose those rights, then the basic freedoms of our people are at risk. I believe we have fallen far short. We have fallen far short of the balance that we always need to look for, ever since the beginning of our Republic-- the balance between security and freedom. I think we missed it here. It is not the Government's job to scare our people; it is the Government's job to protect our people. It is not the Government's job to endanger the privacy of law-abiding Americans, but to protect the privacy of law-abiding Americans. Sadly, we had a number of amendments to this bill which would have brought that balance I talked about into being, the balance between security and freedom. Senator Feingold had an amendment limiting the use and dissemination of information unlawfully obtained through foreign surveillance on U.S. citizens. His amendment would have protected the rights of innocent U.S. citizens and provided a necessary balance to the bill. I was proud to support it because the bill, obviously, needed some more checks and balances. Senator Feingold also had an amendment to provide protection against bulk collection of foreign communications that could include communications of innocent Americans. Again, this measure would have provided additional protection for the rights of American citizens, and I was proud to support it because I believe we need, again, additional checks on enhanced Government surveillance authority. My colleague and friend from California, Senator Feinstein, had an amendment that stated a very important principle: that FISA, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, is the exclusive authority for conducting foreign intelligence surveillance. Why is that important? It is important because this administration argues time and again that ``it has inherent authority'' to conduct warrantless surveillance, or that Congress somehow gave them the authority when it authorized the use of military force in Iraq--a ridiculous claim. The Feinstein amendment was a very important amendment because it would have made it clear that FISA is the exclusive authority, pure and simple. Why was that important going forward? We don't want to have this administration or another one in the future--I don't care which party they are from--spying on the American people and then saying: It is true, we didn't obey FISA, but we thought it was important to go outside the law. If we had adopted the Feinstein amendment, we would have clearly stated that FISA is the law when it comes to conducting surveillance on our own people. The Feinstein amendment--which failed, sadly by only 1 or 2 votes short of the 60-vote hurdle--said we are not going to lose our freedoms, we are not going to allow another administration to spy on us; FISA is going to be the one and only law that pertains here. Finally, there is the issue of immunity for telecommunications companies that cooperated with the administration's warrantless surveillance program. We know that American law did not give these telephone companies the authority to do what they did, but they were somehow persuaded by the administration to go along with them. Not every telephone company, not every communications company did go along. At least one said: Look, we think this is not legal; show us the legality. And they stood, I think, in firm support of their consumers. Here is the problem with granting immunity. Congress has not been given complete information on this program. We do not know the level of involvement by the telephone companies and the telecom companies. We need complete information; we have incomplete information. How can I be a good Senator, how can I do a good job if I don't have the facts surrounding this whole matter of the warrantless surveillance program? When you put out that immunity, you basically stop the court cases, and if you stop the court cases, we will never get to the bottom of this issue and our citizens will never know who was spied on, why were they spied on, what happened, what went wrong, what went right, and how much power this Government tried to exercise over its people illegally. Granting immunity without fully understanding whether our people were illegally spied upon and to what extent, I find that irresponsible. Where is our pride? We wrote a law that said phone companies cannot do this, and they went ahead and did it. Not all of them. Now we are saying: Never mind, President Bush and Vice President Cheney write the law, they make the decision. It is not right. It is not American. It is anti-American. It is not what we do in this great country. President Bush says we are sending our troops overseas to fight for freedom, fight for democracy, and at home they ask the telecom companies to break the law. They spied on Americans, and we cannot find out what they did, how they did it, the details of the program, and now we are going to now grant immunity. I cannot believe that we didn't do better on that particular amendment. That amendment failed. Again, I was proud to stand with Senator Dodd and Senator Feingold on the amendment. In closing, I don't believe this bill strikes the kind of balance we need between broadening the Government's authority to conduct surveillance and protecting the rights of our citizens. We did have many chances today to increase the oversight of FISA surveillance programs. We had many opportunities to hold this administration accountable and future administrations accountable while giving them what they need to go after the bad actors, those who would harm us. I voted to get bin Laden. I voted to go to war against al-Qaida. I voted no on the Iraq war because that was a diversion. I want to get the terrorists who perpetrated 9/11. I want to give any administration the tools they need, but I do not want to expose my constituents and the people of America who are law-abiding and caring and all they live for is for their families--I don't want to subject them to being spied upon. Unfortunately, those amendments all went down. It is sad for me to say that we have a bill that steps on the rights of the freedoms of our people, of the law-abiding Americans in our country and, therefore, I cannot support it. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum, and I ask that the time be taken equally off both sides.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, California and the entire Nation lost a remarkable leader yesterday with the passing of my friend, Congressman Tom Lantos. From his leadership as chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs to his founding of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, Congressman Lantos went about his work with a dignity and a seriousness that transcended politics. In a time of bitter divisions, he earned the respect of colleagues from both sides of the aisle. As a survivor of the Holocaust, Congressman Lantos brought to Congress a profound personal commitment to human rights. We will remember not only his courage and his optimism, but also his deep affection for his adopted country. He leaves behind a legacy of hope and inspiration. On a personal level, it was an honor to call Tom a colleague and a friend. I was proud to work with him on so many important issues. I remember working with him to secure funding to build a tunnel to bypass a section of Route 1 that was so frequently closed by landslides that it was known as ``Devil's Slide.'' It took years, but they broke ground on the tunnel in November. And it is a fitting tribute to the passion with which he served his constituents that there is a bill before the State senate to name that tunnel in his honor. Congressman Lantos was a true statesman, and we will miss him. My heart goes out to his family during this time of grief. They are in our thoughts and in our prayers.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Will the Senator yield for an answer since he mentioned me?

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I speak the truth. I speak the truth. I stood next to Senator Reid, and he made requests on all those issues I outlined--LIHEAP, extended unemployment benefits, tax breaks for solar, et cetera--and the Republican side objected. I speak the truth. I am happy we have joined together on two aspects of the proposal, but the truth is, there is more to the story. We have more work to do. The fact that I mentioned this is to sort of spur you on, to say: Come to the table with us again, and let's do more. That is the reason I said what I said.

Mrs. BOXER. Reserving the right to object, I will not object, If we are doing it this way, I would ask unanimous consent to follow Senator Alexander.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I had asked for 3 minutes. I ask unanimous consent for 4 minutes.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, yesterday we were all very saddened when we failed to get the Senate Finance Committee stimulus package passed. We lost by one vote because Republicans filibustered, and they forced us to get 60. We got 59 votes for that package, but it was not good enough. So now today our Republican friends happily are joining us on two elements of that package, and we are adding it to the House proposal. I am pleased that 20 million senior citizens will get a check as part of the stimulus package, our stimulus package, the Senate's. I thank the senior citizens and their organizations for calling all Senators and telling them it is outrageous to leave out the seniors. I am beyond pleased as well that 250,000 disabled veterans will get a check as part of the Senate's stimulus package. I thank the veterans and their organizations for calling Senators constantly in their offices to say: Make us part of the package. To have left them out would have been outrageous on its face, just as it was outrageous that when the President suggested his package, he wanted to leave out more than 30 million Americans who didn't file tax returns, just paid payroll taxes, and acted as if those working Americans don't deserve to have a check. I thank Speaker Pelosi for fixing that problem. That was a huge problem. She did fix that problem, and now we fixed some more problems. Democrats want to do more. We were stopped again today from doing more. Let me go into that because I stood here on the floor as the Republicans objected to request after request after request to add the rest of the Senate Finance package to the stimulus bill. Senator Reid said: We need to have low-income energy assistance. We know the cost of heating is high, and we know people are suffering under the burden of paying it. No, that was objected to. That was objected to. Then we said, there are some States that have very high unemployment rates, and we see a high unemployment rate beginning to hit many States. We want to extend unemployment insurance to the long- term unemployed. Those are the people who would go right out and spend those checks at the corner store, which is just what we wanted to do. No, our Republican friends said, no. Then we asked unanimous consent to help the homebuilders get a tax break. They are struggling under the horrendous situation we find ourselves in today in the housing market. No, there was objection from our Republican friends. Then we asked, through Senator Reid, for green energy tax breaks so the folks who are out there who are trying to build this economy and get us off foreign oil can get those tax breaks. Republicans said no. Then we were asking if they would allow us to put in here a program President Bush himself endorses--housing revenue bonds to help with the housing crisis. The Republicans said no. We are all very happy that seniors and the disabled veterans are going to have a smile on their face tonight, but we are far from done. We Democrats are going to fight. I come from a State that has 25 percent of the defaults. When I go to towns in my State, we have five roundtable discussions about the terrible situation that our mayors are facing, that our States are facing, that our counties are facing. We need to do more, and we Democrats are not going to give up. This is phase 1. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, today I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring Dr. Lyn Behrens as she retires as president and CEO of Loma Linda University Adventist Health Sciences Center, drawing to a close a successful career in medicine and civic leadership. After completing her degree in medicine from the Sydney University School of Medicine in Australia in 1964, Dr. Behrens became the first and only pediatric resident at Loma Linda University Medical Center in 1966. By 1986, Dr. Behrens was the first female Dean of the School of Medicine, and by 1990 she had become the first female President of Loma Linda University. Five years later she assumed the position of CEO of Adventist Health System, which soon became the Loma Linda University Adventist Health Science Center. In 1999, Dr. Behrens was chosen to serve as President of Loma Linda University Medical Center. Loma Linda University and Medical Center has prospered under her leadership, and has become a preeminent institution for patient care and medical technology. I have had the pleasure of visiting Loma Linda University and have found Dr. Behrens to be an exemplary model to her colleagues, capable of bringing out the best in her associates. During Behrens' tenure, Loma Linda University witnessed the development of a dedicated children's hospital with the most advanced equipment and methodology. The university has also witnessed the development of a center for behavioral medicine, as well as a rehabilitation, orthopaedic and neurosciences institute. The university has also added new schools of pharmacy and science and technology, and has worked diligently to foster its interaction with local research institutes to develop innovation in the use of global information systems to assist with emergency medical response. The first hospital- based center for proton therapy and research has also been developed under Behrens' tenure, and has become a leading institution in the treatment of cancer. The university has taken great strides to improve care and support for our Nation's veterans at the Jerry L. Pettis Memorial VA Medical Center. Dr. Behrens has also been a dynamic leader in her community, working to ensure positive community service to her area and throughout the world. She has been instrumental in bringing to fruition a great number of social and community services organizations and programs. Programs such as the Social Action Community Health Services Clinic, PossAbilities, Community Kids Connection and Operation Jessica, have brought medical and social support to a broad group of individuals. These organizations have assisted special needs and at-risk children and teens, and developed after-school programs and ESL--English Second Language--programs. Dr. Behrens' leadership has also provided for increased medical and community support internationally, providing support in 12 nations, including the only teaching hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan, and the most advanced hospital in mainland China. As she retires from more than four decades of service and leadership in medicine to the communities of California and beyond, I am pleased to ask my colleagues to recognize her for a career of visionary leadership. The future of medical education, research, and service will be forever changed thanks to her bold leadership.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing and honoring the California Institute of Technology's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, JPL, in Pasadena, CA, for 50 years of space exploration. Since the launch of Explorer I, America's first spacecraft, on January 31, 1958, JPL has made momentous and historic contributions to our scientific understanding of our vast universe. For the past five decades, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory has been a respected leader in furthering scientific knowledge around the world. Explorer 1 was built in less than 3 months, and was the first spacecraft ever launched into space that actually revolved around Earth and provided scientific findings from space. The immense success of Explorer I led to the passage of the Space Act in 1958, which established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Since the inception of NASA, JPL has been on the forefront of science and technology through its research and exploration of every known planet in our solar system. Subsequent to the success of Explorer I, JPL has continued to have a central role in accomplished space missions, such as exploring our vast solar system with Voyager 1 and 2 and the Mars Exploration Rovers. JPL has also been instrumental in understanding our planet. I congratulate the California Institute of Technology's Jet Propulsion Laboratory on 50 years of successful and insightful space exploration, and thank the original members of the Explorer I team for their contribution to American history.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak on the Democrats' time to pay tribute to Marine Cpl Sean Andrew Stokes. I thank Senator Kyl for agreeing to this request.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, tomorrow, Wednesday, February 6, at Camp Pendleton in my home State of California, one of the true heroes of our country will receive a rare and distinguished honor. On what would have been his 25th birthday, Marine Cpl Sean Andrew Stokes--and I show you that beautiful face in this picture--will be awarded the Silver Star for heroic actions performed in the line of duty during Operation Phantom Fury in Fallujah, Iraq. From November 9 through November 18 of 2004, then-Private Stokes took the position of ``point'' in his platoon. That means he was the first Marine to enter a building and the first Marine to encounter whatever and whoever was inside. Bullets, grenades, and rockets were around every corner. For 9 days and nights, Sean fought insurgents in hand-to- hand combat, in house after house, in building after building. Most of us would lose our sanity in such a place, but Sean kept his sanity with a simple prayer of thanks after coming out of each house alive. Word of Sean's actions over those days quickly spread. The History Channel made a documentary about the battle of Fallujah, and Sean's heroic actions were prominently featured. Embedded in Sean's platoon was Pat O'Donnell, a historian who wrote a critically acclaimed book, ``We Were One: Shoulder to Shoulder with the Marines Who Took Fallujah.'' Mr. O'Donnell has said Sean hid his wounds on more than one occasion so he could stay with his Marine brothers rather than take the mandatory medical evacuation. He said: Sean always put others first before himself. Sean will be receiving the Silver Star tomorrow for his actions on his first tour. His father Gary conducted research, and as best as he can tell, Sean is the first Marine to be awarded the Silver Star for actions while a private since two Marine privates received such an honor during the Vietnam war. In September 2005, Sean returned to Iraq, once again at the front of his platoon, where he distinguished himself and was eventually promoted to corporal. Sean could have left the Marine Corps at the end of that tour. His father urged him to get out, but Sean said: What about everybody else? He felt the need to stick by his buddies who had stood by his side every single day in Iraq. In April of 2007, Sean went back for his third deployment. Sean's father wrote: He went back to Iraq to protect his best friend, Bradley Adams, and because he wanted to be a Marine more than anything else in life. Sean, along with Bradley, was assigned to the battalion commander's personal security detachment, a position reserved for elite and combat- seasoned warriors. The two managed to eventually maneuver their way into the lead vehicle, once again taking point, which earned Sean the nickname ``Pathfinder.'' That battalion commander told Gary Stokes his son had saved his life on numerous occasions, including on July 30, 2007, the day Sean Stokes died from an improvised explosive device attack while on patrol in Al Anbar Province. Over 820 men and women who were either from California or based in California have died in Iraq. This young and heroic Marine is one of them. Sean Stokes represented the best of the Marine Corps, the best of the United States, the best of California. He was born 25 years ago Wednesday in Fremont, CA. He grew up in the gold country of California in the town of Auburn. He was into cars and his dad says he had lots of them. When he returned from his first tour in Iraq, the people of Auburn learned he wanted to fix up his Honda Prelude, so they, the people of the town, put on some new rims, spruced it up, and made it look good--all free of charge--for Sean. He attended Bear River High School, where he played linebacker on the football team and the outfield on the baseball team. Upon learning that Sean died, Bear River retired his No. 51 football jersey, the first time the school has ever retired a number. Of his baseball ability, Sean's dad draws a parallel to a great home- run hitter also born on Wednesday--Babe Ruth. He said it is no coincidence that he was the only kid on the all-star team to hit the ball out of Babe Ruth Baseball Park onto the nearby road, not once but three times. Sean's dad also says he was quite popular and had lots of girlfriends. But he had found true love and was engaged to Nicole Besier, a beautiful young girl who is also a Marine. Gary Stokes wrote to me about his son: Sean turned out to be a great fisherman and from the time he was a little guy, he loved to fish. I remember taking Sean camping, and that is all he wanted to do the entire time during our camping trips and other outings and vacations. Even though I understand that the Tigris River was polluted and at times surrounded by terrorists, I would be surprised if Sean did not throw in a fishing line a few times during one of his three tours in Iraq. ``Sean, like his brother Kevin, is a great son,'' his father writes. We do have a photo, I believe, of Kevin. We are going to get out the photo to show the brothers together. Sean, like his brother Kevin, is a great son, and we always would make sure to make time to do fun things together as much as possible, like golf, fishing, or camping. This is a picture of Sean and his brother. His father continues: Sean and I made the commitment years ago to not be like the father and son in the song ``Cats in the Cradle.'' Sean has touched many lives during his short life and he was loved and was respected by everyone whom he met. Sean's life was short, but it was full and he always gave it his all in everything he did. Tomorrow's ceremony at Camp Pendleton honors the heroism and the bravery of Sean Stokes. Similar to the other Marines out at Camp Pendleton and the rest of the men and women in uniform around the world, he volunteered to carry the burden of protecting our beloved Nation. He fought for the man next to him and for the troops behind him, and he died in service to them. We owe him our gratitude. And we owe his family our gratitude and we owe the families of all the men and women who serve in harm's way our gratitude. We can never forget what they have sacrificed. I conclude as the Senator from California, we have lost so many. As a mother, as a grandmother, I will do everything, along with my colleagues, to bring our troops home and to spare others the deep grief this family has endured. I again thank Senator Kyl for his graciousness in allowing me to have this opportunity to pay tribute to Sean. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I have been trying to get to the floor since this morning--well, actually, since we came into session at 2 o'clock. We have had a very spirited debate about FISA, and now we have invoked cloture on the stimulus package just to begin this debate. I also want to add my voice of distress that we may be facing a slowdown here on the stimulus package. We are in a recession in California. This isn't a recession ``maybe''; this is a recession in California. There are several States that already have begun a recession, a real recession, including a contraction in jobs, and a housing crisis that has hit our State. We can't wait. When the minority leader, the Republican leader, says: Oh, my goodness, LIHEAP was added to the package--of all people who understand this, it is the Presiding Officer. LIHEAP is a program that has been around for a very long time, and it is low-income energy assistance. To express shock that this would be added to a stimulus package or to say we need hours and hours of delay to study the impact of adding LIHEAP, it just strains credulity. Would my leader like me to pause for a question?

Mrs. BOXER. I have the floor.

Mrs. BOXER. Yes, so you can ask a question.

Mrs. BOXER. Yes, I will.

Mrs. BOXER. Yes.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I want to say, while my leadership team is here, I have just gotten the 2 pages--actually, it is 1\1/2\ pages--of the additional language on LIHEAP. The rest was taken verbatim from the House bill, which the President supports.

Mrs. BOXER. I read it while the Senator talked with Senator Schumer. This is LIHEAP, a program that has been around for decades. This is $1 billion to help people pay for the expensive cost of heating their homes. As I look at my friend, Senator Sanders, who is in the chair, what a champion of this program he is--to those in the Northeast in particular. I have to take the minority leader at his word. He says the reason he is holding everything up, he doesn't want to do any work--or do anything--because he must study this bill. If he were here now--of course, he is now gone, but Senator Kyl is here--I would say let's read this together. This is easy, almost as easy as ``Jane and John took the dog for a walk.'' Yet, still, they come out here and are holding up the business of the Senate and the country. Mr. President, I say to my leaders, look, we can argue about how many angels dance on the head of a pin, but 20 million seniors are waiting for this. They were left out of the President's and the House package. I wish to say to my friend, Senator McConnell--and he is not here right now--that this matters. When he says the deal has been cut, that the President agreed with the House, well, wait a minute, look at the Constitution. There is a Senate, there is a House, and there is a President. We work together. We work our will, they work theirs, and we get together and compromise. Twenty million seniors were left out, and we are fixing that. What else? We are also fixing the fact that they left out 250,000 disabled veterans. So why are we holding up work on something as simple as that? The answer comes back in a very convoluted way. I just have to say to someone who represents a State that is in a recession--and I know the State of the Senator from Nevada is in a recession. Many States are in a recession. The President said we should act and we are not acting; we are not acting on FISA. Again, to respond, Senator Bond and Senator Rockefeller agree on how to fix the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Well, good for them. But guess what. The Senate has to debate that and work its will. Some people think the phone companies should have immunity. Some of us other folks think that if you give them immunity, you will never find out who was spied on and how, why, and how long they were spied on. We feel strongly. Is the minority suggesting that because two Senators agree, the rest of us are ``chopped liver,'' as my mother would say? This place is like ``Alice in Wonderland.'' Tonight, more than any other night, it is like ``Alice in Wonderland.'' You have a President who is scared about the economy. He is begging us to act on the stimulus package, and we have intelligent Senators stand up--and they are very smart--on the floor saying: Oh my goodness, you added LIHEAP, and now, we are sorry, we are holding everything up. And then they said maybe they won't. I hope they will not. While I support, with every fiber of my body, the Senate package, it is just the start of what we need to do. Until we start paying attention to the needs of the American people and end the war in Iraq, which is stealing our treasure, both in our young men and women in uniform and our money, we will never get where we need to get.

Mrs. BOXER. Yes.

Mrs. BOXER. I am very glad the majority leader is going to do that because the President--not only is he pushing us to pass his version of the stimulus package--and he is worried about it; he is scaring the American people, saying if we don't have FISA done, terrible things will happen. It is time to stop scaring the people and start protecting the people. That is what we want to do. So I am going to support the leader's call to move to FISA. I believe if we have a debate on the stimulus and we don't talk about the biggest drain on our people--the Iraq war--we are missing the elephant in the room, because until we end this war once and for all and end this failed policy in Iraq, we are simply going to be dragged down further and further into an abyss, where we don't have the funds we need for the rest of the things we do, where our military is being stretched, and where we have no way out. We actually have Republican candidates who are running for President saying we might be in Iraq for a hundred years. I have been around politics a long time--not quite a hundred years but for my adult lifetime. I have served with four Presidents from both parties. What an honor to have served with all of them. But I have never, ever worked with a President who didn't have a clue as to how to end a war he got us into--not a clue. I have never seen a President who hasn't given us some idea of how a war will end. So we need to remove this weight from around our necks. If we don't, my future, your future, the future of our kids and grandkids is not going to be what it ought to be. We are spending $10 billion a month in Iraq. That is $2.5 billion a week and $357 million a day in Iraq. And the President and my Republican colleagues say we cannot afford to extend the stimulus package to include seniors and disabled veterans? Well, for the price of 1 month in Iraq, we can provide rebates to 20 million seniors who need it the most. Let me say that again. For the price of 1 month in Iraq, we can provide rebates to 20 million seniors who need it the most. I hope the senior citizens within the sound of my voice have already contacted us to tell us to cover them in this recovery package. They are the ones who really need it the most because they are living on a fixed income and they are struggling. Some of them have to cut their pills in half every day they have to take them to stay alive so they can stretch their medicine. Well, the President and my Republican colleagues say we cannot afford to extend the stimulus package to include disabled veterans. That is why we have these charts made up here: 250,000 disabled veterans. I hope they are also calling. These are the folks who should be honored, loved, appreciated, but not just with words but by deeds. Mr. President, I will tell you, for less than the cost of 1 day in Iraq, we can provide rebates to 250,000 disabled veterans--1 day in Iraq. We can take care of our veterans. That is why we don't know why this stalling is going on. What about our kids? For less than the cost of 3 months in Iraq, we can enroll every eligible child in the Head Start Program and give them the start they deserve. For the cost of 2 weeks in Iraq, we can provide health insurance for 6 million uninsured children in the United States for a year. The list goes on and on. Last year, in the name of budget austerity, the President vetoed children's health care. But he has an open checkbook for Iraq. He puts it straight on the debt. He vetoed critical investments in our infrastructure. Mr. President, the occupant of the chair helped me when we worked together on the Environment Committee with Senator Inhofe. We overrode a veto because the President said: Sorry, we are rebuilding in Iraq. But we cannot afford to fix our infrastructure here in America. The President vetoed education spending and health research. I don't know about my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, but when I talk to families, they are very scared now about a lot of things. One of those things is, is someone getting cancer or getting Alzheimer's, or is a child getting autism, and there are a lot of other fears. They are real fears because they hit millions of our families. But the President vetoed the bill that had that health research money in it. We were forced to cut back. So where are we now? We are spending money we don't have in Iraq. Remember when Budget Director Mitch Daniels said the war would cost no more than $60 billion? Paul Wolfowitz assured us that with Iraqi oil revenue, the war would pay for itself. Some people said the war might cost $200 billion, and they were ridiculed as vastly overstating the costs. Well, the President's most recent stimulus package is almost that. The President has spent more than half a trillion dollars on his failed policy. There is no end in sight. It is shorting the funds we need to rebuild our own country--and it is borrowed money. It needs to stop. We are hemorrhaging taxpayer money in Iraq, and the wake is beyond disgraceful. For a base in Iraq that was never built, we paid a contractor $72 million. We paid them to build a barracks for the police academy in Baghdad, and instead we got a building with ``giant cracks snaking through newly built walls and human waste dripping from the ceiling.'' The administration loaded $9 billion in cash onto pallets and shipped it to Iraq, where it simply disappeared. And we cannot take care of 250,000 disabled veterans or 20 million seniors, and we cut spending to find a cure for diseases that ail our people. We cut funding from afterschool programs when our kids desperately need to have a place to go after school. Mr. President, the Republicans are stalling because these facts, when we have these debates, are coming to light. So they are stalling. Can you imagine what would happen if $9 billion disappeared from a Federal grant in Vermont or California or Minnesota or New Jersey or Ohio? The people responsible would go to prison. But in Iraq, the President shrugged it off. The President said we lack fiscal discipline. Yet, look what he has done to this budget. He took a surplus and turned it into a massive deficit, and he took a debt we were paying down and it exploded on his watch. For him to say we are not fiscally responsible because we want to invest in our people, we want to invest in our infrastructure, we want to find cures for disease, and, yes, we want to invest in alternative energy so we don't have to be dependent on foreign oil and we can clean our air of the carbon dioxide that is warming the planet--fiscal irresponsibility? That is the name of the game with this administration, whether it is the missing billions or the bases that were never built or this enormous embassy that is being built in Baghdad. It is nothing short of breathtaking. The President and his supporters shrug their shoulders, and yet we cannot get to the stimulus package because somebody said they don't understand we have added $1 billion, 1\1/2\ pages to the bill to help poor people pay for energy. They have to be kidding. That is a stall. The checkbook is open for Iraq; it is closed for America. This President wouldn't even be doing what he is doing now unless he is scared this recession is hitting. Let me tell you what else we added to this stimulus bill that is being held up. We took the House language as it pertained to the housing crisis, and we increased the amounts that Freddie and Fannie and FHA can lend our homeowners to give them the chance to refinance these mortgages to keep responsible homeowners in their homes. We cannot wait on this provision. We can't wait on it. Thousands and thousands of cities are witnessing these foreclosures. What happens when a home forecloses? The pool might go. The new owner of the home ignores keeping up the property, and it is a danger to have a pool that has not been attended to. Mosquitoes breed in the pool and the whole lawn gets all brown and the values go down and suddenly you have a downward spiral. We have to turn it around. But somebody has to hold up a bill because they have to read 1\1/2\ pages about LIHEAP, a program that has been around for decades and, by the way, supported on both sides of the aisle. The toll this Iraq war is having on our Armed Forces is stretching our military to the breaking point. Recently, we learned with sadness in our hearts that suicide attempts among U.S. troops have reached a record high, a sixfold increase since 2002. Last year, the Washington Post reported there was a readiness death spiral, that is their term, that senior officers warn puts our Nation at risk because we lack the strategic reserve of ground forces to respond to potential crises throughout the world. We are borrowing billions, putting that cost on the backs of our kids and grandkids, shorting our ability to take care of the people who need us now that the economy is in a downturn, and that hurts our security.